Well - i just burned a (fully legit of course!) MP3 CD just to see how it played - and.......... it played VERY well - 150 songs on 1 CD Who needs an ipod (except if you have over 900 songs, which i don't have) - So with a 6-CD changer, you can easily put away over 900 songs.

Now let's calculate: 900 songs x 3.5 mins on average = 52.5 hours of your favorite music - with an hour commute each way, i don't have to listen to the same song for over a month!!

I am pleasantly surprised that Land Rover did load up the car with all these excellent specs (then again: why not a set of floormats included as well?)- Robert

My biggest nit on the MP3 support on RRS and LR3: No way to display track (tag) info at all. Also, no CD Text support. (The audio CD equivalent.) Even a 15K Scion xB has this feature. It's a little hard to navigate through 6 discs of MP3 content without any real music identification available.

But it does nicely play high bitrate LAME encoded MP3 files well... can't tell much of a difference between them and my original CDs. Too bad the total stereo system is far from my ideal, as there is a little that can be done to upgrade it due to it's very integrated nature.

Since I am getting the SE spec without SAT NAV I am doing some research on the idea of using the money I saved on not having SAT NAV and a spare spot for the screen and putting together an in-car PC for the Navigation, for MP3's, for DVD video....etc.

There's a lot of info on the web and it seems do-able as a DIY project or even as a professional install.

Thu Jun 30 2005 3:23pm

RRUK

Member Since: 10 Jun 2005
Location: Certainly In-Vogue
Posts: 2485

I have some 217GB of Mp3s..that's a lot of CD burning! Think I'll stick to plugging in my Mp3 player into the Aux socket, at least that way, I can look at the screen to see what track is playing.2013MY L405 RR VSE
2008 Discovery HSE

Since I am getting the SE spec without SAT NAV I am doing some research on the idea of using the money I saved on not having SAT NAV and a spare spot for the screen and putting together an in-car PC for the Navigation, for MP3's, for DVD video....etc.

There's a lot of info on the web and it seems do-able as a DIY project or even as a professional install.[/quote]
re sat nav,and dvd player, have you found one that will fit into the space provided by RR on the dash ??

Yet to get my RRS.....curiously I am thinking of Red....and my birth sign is Scorpio!!

The common screen size appears to be 7" which is standard DIN sized so I think it should fit into that space....ideally one that is motorised would be cool. Perhaps you can post the measurements of that space (width, height and diagonally)

I was interested in some people using the new MAC Mini as their computer...very compact PC....and I think it may fit easily into the top glove box...which is ideal for running to the screen.

It's not an easy project, though there are some companies out there beginning to do more Carputer's. While I wait for my RRS I'll continue my research. For the price of the RRS SatNav to can have something so much more useful and upgradeable.

Sat Jul 09 2005 8:26am

Tim in Scotland

Member Since: 30 May 2005
Location: Driving along in my automobile
Posts: 16967

Carputers?

No need for anything terribly complex............ it's not integrated but then I have 2 Land Rovers to shuffle the gear between, I use an HP Ipaq3760 with Navman expansion/GPS sleeve with Navman voice instruction mapping software and a 4Gb microdrive in the slot. It has Bluetooth and I have a WiFi card in the SD expansion port so can surf the net when I stop outside Macdonalds, Starbucks and at nearly all UK motorway service areas - there are also a huge number of unsecured wifi routers in use so can piggyback onto broadband for free outside many houses and offices.....
The later version of Ipaq have integrated cellphones but less potential for expansion. On my 4GB microdrive, in addition to running the Navman for the whole of Europe I also have the entire UK Ordnace Survey map library from Shetland south to the Scilly Islands and can lock the GPS position into the centre of the screen so the map moves relative to the car. The version of Navman I use doesn't have postcode input but more recent versions do.
OS maps are very useful offroad (something I suspect not many of you are that interested in having ) but also when you get to somewhere that is not in the Navman database I can switch over to OS and zoom right down to a street map.
The Ipaq also has MP3, and does Windows Media files so I can also play video. There is also an audio out socket so I can plug it into the car radio aux socket and use that as well.
The benefit to me is that as it sticks on the windscreen with a sucker and plugs into the cigarette lighter socket for power so there is no permanent damage to the dash and I can shift it from RR Sport to Defender and back in seconds!
And I can take it into the house and synchronise it with my PC/Laptop and copy Word and Excel files, photos and music dead easily either by removing the micro drive and plugging it's card reader into the laptop and dragging files or using the ActivSync and a firewire for file transfer. On batteries it can really use up power it you don't exit programmes and leave them running in the background.

Downsides............... few, but the screen is small (it's a PDA after all) and the power connection is very fiddly and the connecting pins on the lead easily bent. With the Navman GPS sleeve on the set-up is not really pocket sized anymore, but at least you can stick it on your bike, boat or on your belt and use it away from the car! And of course on a sucker cup on the screen it isn't as elegant as an indash system. Price........... well as much as you want to pay, but mine was somewhere in the region of £1200 3 years ago including all the OS software, Navman and wifi card.
In Scotland we have a specialist PDA centre in Glasgow at www.totalpda.co.uk
TomTom navigator can also be run this way. Also with the latest G3 mobile phones you can have a version of TomTom navigator too!